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John MacDonald
"Instead of a dependent colony, Britain will have in us a cordially allied nation; though one people, two countries, a second in North America, to stand with her in peace or in war." - Sir John MacDonald '' '''Sir John Alexander MacDonald GCB KCMG QC (11, January, 1815 - 6, June, 1891) '''was a British author, banker, businessman, diplomat, lawyer, politician, soldier and statesman. During his career, MacDonald served as a Member of Parliament, thirteenth Attorney-General of the Province of Ontario, sixth Premier of the Province of Ontario, first Attorney-General of the Dominion of Canada, first Prime Minister of the Dominion of Canada, eighteenth Minister for the United Kingdom of Great Britain to the United States of America, seventh Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations, fourth Minister of Interior Affairs, thirteenth President of Her Majesty's Privy Council and third Minister of Transport. MacDonald's administration enshrined the Constitution of the Dominion of Canada, conglomerated the colonies of British North America as the Dominion of Canada, established the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Supreme Court of the Dominion of Canada, expanded the Dominion threefold it's original size, founded the Canadian Pacific Railway Company, implemented protectionist policies and trade tariffs to secure Canadian industries from American dominance, oversaw the construction of the Trans-Continental Railroad, practiced economic solidarity with the British Empire through preferential trade with Britain and suppressed rebellions by Irish-American Fenians and Metis nationalists against the Crown. MacDonald personally acted as Chairman of the Canadian Constitutional Conference of 1866, authored the Constitution of the Dominion of Canada, drafted the ''First Nations Act of 1876, establishing land reservations for Beringian inhabitants of the region, residential assimilation schools and systematized racial segregation, ensured the Dominion's economic sovereignty and ethnic homogeneity, established the Royal Commission on Chinese Immigration, imposing taxation on Chinese foreign labourers, introduced the Manitoba Act of 1870, dividing the territories of Prince Rupert's Land into Provinces, lead the Canadian delegation at the Washington Conference of 1871 and signed the Anglo-American Treaty of 1871. Biography John Alexander MacDonald was born to Hugh Macdonald, a merchant, and his wife Helen (born Shaw,) at Ramshorn Parish in Glasgow, Scotland on 11, January, 1815. He was the third of five siblings, including: William, Margaret, James and Louisa. In 1820, the MacDonald family migrated Kingston in the British colony of Upper Canada. Education John began his education as a student at the Midland District Grammar School in Kingston, and the private co-educational Academy of Kingston, studying arithmetic, English, geography, grammar, Greek, history, Latin and rhetoric. His formal education ended in 1830 and his family encouraged him to pursue a career in law, a field which he was well suited for as a result of his education in classical arts, typical for wealthy Britons in the Victorian era but often unavailable to the socioeconomic class MacDonald found himself in. In 1834, MacDonald traveled to Toronto to receive his first examination by the Law Society of Upper Canada, following which he began his clerkship at the law firm George Mackenzie in Kingston, occasionally managing the office while Mackenzie was traveling and on one occasion taking over the office of lawyer Lowther Macpherson, Mackenzie's cousin in Picton. Personal Life and Family Political Ideology Economic Policy MacDonald, though a shrewd businessman in his personal life, implemented a protectionist policy with the intent of preventing American dominance of Canadian industry, appealing to the public as an advocate for the ideals of securing the economic sovereignty of the Dominion and maintaining loyalty to the mother country. One notable exception during his career as a diplomatic representative of both Canada and the United Kingdom, allowed him to secure access to international North American fisheries guaranteed in a reciprocity agreement between Canada and the United States. Foreign Policy Within the Empire, MacDonald was amongst the first advocates of a confederation of British colonies in Australasia, and later expressed his disappointment at the failure of such a possibility to come to fruition in correspondence with colleagues in Canada and the United Kingdom. In the decade following his death, the newly confederated colonies of Oceania were inaugurated as the Dominion of Australia and the Dominion of New Zealand. Social Policy MacDonald maintained many opinions typical of Anglo-Saxon men of the Victorian era, the fundamentally conservative character of his society contrasted well with his implacable pragmatism, allowing him to secure victories for his party whilst simultaneously adhering to the common values of the era. MacDonald's migration policies intended to secure the characteristically Anglo-Saxon demographic of the Dominion. Advocating to maintain and promote ethnic homogeneity in Canada in 1885, MacDonald stated before the House of Commons: "The Aryan races will not wholesomely amalgamate with the Africans or the Asiatics, they lack British aspirations, feelings and instincts. The coexistence of those races, like the interbreeding of the dog and the fox, is not successful; it cannot be, and never will be." - Sir John MacDonald '' Customary of European settlers in North America, MacDonald maintained a paternalistic attitude toward the Beringian tribes of the continent. He desired to assimilate the native population through a program of reeducation and resettlement, and acted as architect of the ''First Nations Act of 1876, which established residential schools for Beringian children and granted land reserves to Beringian tribes based on territorial claims guaranteed in treaties between the Beringians and the Crown. Trivia * MacDonald was multilingual and fluent in English, Greek and Latin.